Pitching and defense win championships, that much is true. With today’s announcement that Josh Fields will start the season in Charlotte and Juan Uribe will cover second base duties, the following are also true:
- Half of the Sox’ infield is proven to be untradeable, and not in a good way
- Their second baseman is a shortstop playing out of position
- Their third baseman has a back problem he hasn’t entirely recovered from, either in the field or at the plate
- Their center fielder is questionable with the glove although solid with the bat
- Their left fielder will be a platoon of an injury risk and a Gold Glove-caliber center fielder
- Their right fielder has come a long way back to earth since the 2005/2006 heydays
- Sixty percent of their starting rotation is coming off of seasons of 5+ ERAs
- All but one of their relievers are either wildly inconsistent, rapidly declining or totally unproven
- Exactly one starting pitcher has both a pickoff move and a compact enough delivery to hold a runner at first
- Their starting catcher has one of the lowest success rates throwing out attempted steals in the entire sport
Make your own predictions, folks. The 35th Street season preview will be posted over the weekend once the official 25-man roster is out, lest we make any hasty and premature statement’s about this team’s inevitable descent into a long, boring fight for third place.